Drug deaths: Scottish minister vows to tackle “public health emergency”

The number of people dying from drug use in Scotland is a “public health emergency” that the government is determined to fix, the country’s public health minister has vowed.

Speaking at the Faculty of Public Health’s annual conference in Dunblane on 28 November, Joe Fitzpatrick said he would support any measures to reduce the “devastating impact of substance misuse.”

Scotland has the highest number of drug related deaths in Europe and possibly the world.1

Fitzpatrick said that the government would …